How Can the Livestock and Poultry Farming Industry Prevent Floods and Fight Floods? Detailed Explanation of Emergency Technical Measures

????I. Rescue Livestock, Poultry and Feed, and Do a Good Job of Reinforcing and Overhauling Livestock and Poultry Pens.

1. Move all feed and raised livestock and poultry in low-lying areas to pens on higher ground that are not submerged in water, build temporary pens and cool sheds with good heat insulation performance, and avoid livestock and poultry being hit by heavy rainfall. Do a good job of storing forage and feed to prevent rain leaching and mildew and deterioration.

2. Inspect and reinforce the pens (including roofs), overhaul the roofs and doors and windows of all pens, feed warehouses and drug warehouses, and promptly repair any places with rain leakage to avoid livestock and poultry being drenched and feed and drugs becoming damp.

3. Sell and dispose of livestock and poultry that have reached market age and breeding livestock and poultry that have reached culling age as soon as possible to reduce losses.

4. Stock up on feed, vaccines, veterinary drugs and bedding materials in a timely manner to prevent road interruptions during the flood season from affecting normal production.

????II. Do a Good Job of Feeding Management During the Flood Season

1. Livestock and poultry should be given clean water to drink. Drinking dirty water must be prohibited, and even more so, they must not drink water contaminated by livestock and poultry excrement or livestock and poultry carcasses.

2. Livestock and poultry should eat feed with relatively comprehensive nutrition that is qualified, and eating moldy and deteriorated feed must be prohibited. Add health-care and anti-stress drugs such as multivitamins and electrolytes to drinking water or feed, and add some antibacterial drugs such as amoxicillin and florfenicol to enhance the disease resistance of livestock and poultry and prevent secondary infections and the occurrence of bacterial epidemic diseases.

3. Strengthen disinfection and thoroughly eliminate diseased areas. Farms after heavy rain, especially livestock and poultry farms submerged by floods, are extremely prone to breeding various pathogenic microorganisms. For this reason, on the basis of repairing and reinforcing damaged pens, livestock owners should promptly clean up silt and dirt, and strictly disinfect all pens, roads, feed troughs, utensils and the surrounding environment of the farm. If necessary, disinfection can be carried out continuously for several days to comprehensively and thoroughly eliminate pathogenic bacteria already present in the farm or introduced from the outside, and strictly prevent the occurrence of epidemic diseases.

4. Do a good job of ventilation in the pens. The flood season usually brings wind and rain, so doors and windows should be closed well, but at the same time attention should be paid to ventilation and air exchange to prevent poisoning and death caused by gases such as carbon monoxide. Half of the windows can be opened promptly for air exchange during intervals when the wind is weak and the rain has stopped. Livestock and poultry houses with ventilation equipment can ventilate and exchange air at regular times. Promptly clean up manure in the houses, replace damp bedding, and try to keep the houses dry to avoid diseases caused by excessive humidity and too much ammonia.

5. Do a good job of pollution control, promptly drain water around livestock and poultry houses, and keep cleaned livestock and poultry manure away from water sources and conduct centralized piling and fermentation treatment, so as to avoid environmental pollution caused by accumulated water and livestock and poultry excrement and affect the safety of livestock and poultry production.

6. Harmlessly dispose of animal carcasses. Livestock and poultry drowned during flood periods, especially in hot weather, are prone to rot and stench and may also transmit diseases to healthy livestock and poultry. To eliminate hidden dangers, farms and households should promptly salvage and transport away carcasses, put dead and diseased animals into harmless treatment pools (carcass decomposition pools), or dig pits in plots far from water sources and on high, dry terrain for deep burial, and strictly disinfect the relevant sites to prevent the spread of pathogens from endangering human and animal safety. For diseased (drowned) livestock and poultry, the "four noes and one treatment" must be strictly adopted, namely no slaughtering, no eating, no selling, and no transport. Dead livestock and poultry must undergo harmless treatment, and the spread and expansion of the epidemic and harm to human and animal safety must be strictly prevented.

7. During the flood season, temperatures are sometimes low, so chicken houses should adopt local insulation to prevent chilling.

8. During the flood season, sunlight is sometimes greatly reduced, so laying hens and breeding chickens should have enhanced lighting, with 16--17 hours of continuous lighting every day, and the light intensity should be guaranteed to be no less than 32 lux to prevent a decrease in egg production.

9. Inspect and reinforce chicken houses. Inspect and clear drainage ditches. Carefully check the electrical wiring on the farm to ensure normal power supply.

10. Promptly replenish production materials such as feed.

?III. Do a Good Job of Animal Epidemic Disease Prevention and Control During the Flood Season.

After the flood season, the relatively threatening infectious diseases that are generally prone to occur mainly include avian influenza, Newcastle disease, swine fever, foot-and-mouth disease, colibacillosis and certain respiratory system diseases, etc. In response, first, antibody levels should be closely monitored and emergency immunization should be carried out. In particular, emergency supplementary immunization should be carried out once for livestock and poultry that have exceeded the immune protection period and for newly restocked livestock and poultry, ensuring that the immunization density reaches 100%. Second, the dynamics of the epidemic should be closely watched. Once abnormal situations such as acute onset in livestock and poultry, rapid spread, high incidence rate or high mortality are found, they should immediately be reported to the local animal husbandry and veterinary competent department or animal health supervision office, and cooperate with government departments in handling the epidemic. Third, strengthen disinfection and source elimination and the diagnosis and treatment of diseased livestock and poultry to prevent the occurrence and spread of the epidemic. Fourth, strengthen quarantine supervision in the links of livestock and poultry transport, processing and storage, severely crack down on illegal acts of operating dead and diseased livestock and poultry, and ensure human and animal safety.

According to the provisions of GB16548-2006, the specific requirements for the burial (deep burial) treatment method of diseased animal carcasses are as follows:

1. The burial site should be far away from schools, public places, residential areas, villages, animal raising and slaughtering sites, drinking water source areas, rivers and other areas.

2. Before burial, the diseased animal carcasses and diseased animal products to be buried should be incinerated;

3. Spread 2 cm of quicklime at the bottom of the burial pit;

4. After burial, the buried soil needs to be tamped solid, and the upper layer of the diseased animal carcasses and diseased animal products should be more than 1.5 m from the ground surface;

5. The surface of the incinerated diseased animal carcasses and diseased animal products, as well as the ground environment after burial, should be sprayed and sprinkled with effective disinfectants for disinfection.

Wang Hu, Dingzhou City Agriculture Bureau, Hebei Province